I've played it on ps2

A friend of mine got the game today on ps2, so I managed to try the game for a short time. The guy has only one gamepad, so I didn't test multiplayer.

I took a look at the menus, and there are options to change competition names, player names, team names, and short team names. There is no player or team creation option.

There are a lot of unlockables, and how to unlock them is written so you don't have to guess. One of the ways to unlock an item was hitting the referee 5 times in a match

I played two singleplayer games, the presentention is nice, and loading times are short.

My first match was Toulouse vs Castres, at millenium stadium on easy mode. There are only five stadia , but some more are unlockable.

Gameplay-wise, well, I was a bit disappointed. The game is clearly not WCR. It plays differently, there are less automatic mauls, less "big hits", and this is a plus. But somehow when I played, I felt like I didn't have too many options. That's maybe I'm not used to the gamepad layout.

The game was ruck -> pass -> run -> try offload -> miss -> ruck and so on 95% of my playing time. But that's because on easy mode, the AI doesn't play bad, but the conquest is way too easy. You seem to win almost every ruck and every scrum so you never loose the ball. And since the AI is good, you don't win points either.

So my game ended 0-0 after 40mn overtime. Yes, the long overtimes are still there.

I never lost the ball, but I didn't win, so I tried another game. I player France vs England, still on easy.

The game went on smoother, I managed to place some offloads, and even managed to score a try (unconverted). After a real bad kick, england got the ball and scored. The game ended up on time.

I then sat back and thought about it : I had fun. With a bit of offload, kicking and sidestep training, the game can end up being incredible. Every ettempt of passing out wide was defeated by the AI. But there is still the risk of finding some unbreakable tactic which would ruin the single player experience.

I'm still undecided on whether it is a masterpiece or just a nice try. But I preordered the PC version, and didn't cancel it. I want to play it more.

Some good points :

- The offloading system seems to be nice once mastered. Interceptions are frequent.
- The L2 button calling/passing to the fly half is a nice idea
- The defensive lines not always well placed
- Way smoother than WCR
- Nice kicking system
- Intense game

Some bad points :

- The referee is blind (forward passes!)
- The referee is silent (his interventions are very very rare)
- Commentaries sucks, the guy doesn't even say player names
- The return of centuries-long overtimes
- On standard camera view, I had trouble recognizing players. So I didn't know who had the ball, played on the wing with forwards... But it's a TV thing I guess.
- No fatigue ? Didn't notice any indicator, even in player replacement.
- Didn't know that Besten was such a good kicker (from my 22 to 5m before their goal line)

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Nice review, thanks for taking the time to write it. I'm really looking forward to the game and your review wet my appetite even more for it. It's a shame about some of the things e.g. no player creation.

Did you notice if, when you start a tournament, do you get to select your squad from a list of players from your country (EA Cricket 2004)?

I don't know if you did anything like that just wondering. 15 days and counting!

Originally posted by Coco@Jan 19 2006, 06:55 AMNice review, thanks for taking the time to write it. I'm really looking forward to the game and your review wet my appetite even more for it. It's a shame about some of the things e.g. no player creation.

Did you notice if, when you start a tournament, do you get to select your squad from a list of players from your country (EA Cricket 2004)?

I don't know if you did anything like that just wondering. 15 days and counting!

Coco

Click to expand...

The option to select the starting line-up is there, but I only tried it with toulouse (I know they have quality backs, but Thomas was on the bench ), so I don't know if you can pick up every player of a given country or only pre-selected ones.

Me and my bro would play JLR for agesss after fulltime till we got a winner and such 15mins was never long enough so im glad overtime goes for ages,you dont like long overtime? then kick the damn ball out... GAME OVER.